Rap central

Radio station WHPK makes a big impact with a little signal

May 14, 2006|By Moira McCormick, Special to the Tribune

Turn your radio dial to Chicago's commercial FM stations such as WGCI or B96, and you'll hear bucketloads of slick, uber-commercial rap. Rap's been big business for years, the tent pole of ratings powerhouse 'GCI and top-rated broadcast behemoths across the country.

Hard to believe, then, that just two short decades ago, the only hip-hop music heard on local airwaves came from a low-power college station, the University of Chicago's WHPK-FM 88.5. Broadcasting -- well, narrowcasting, really -- from its cramped 57th Street headquarters in Hyde Park, 'HPK's modest signal could be picked up solely on the South Side, and not always clearly even there. Yet the influence that 'HPK's continuous rap programming has exerted on Chicago's homegrown hip-hop scene, since its 1984 debut, is immeasurable.

You'd be hard-pressed to find any current South Side MCs, producers or deejays who didn't grow up obsessively taping WHPK's weekly shows, including those of the legendary JP Chill, the Friday night deejay who in 2006 marks his 20th consecutive year at 'HPK -- certainly one of the longest-running (if not the longest-running, period) hip-hop radio shows in the country -- or spend untold hours perfecting their skills in hopes of making their own debut on WHPK.

The station's even been immortalized by Chicago native Common. Conscious rap's noted leading light, then known as Common Sense, used to drop by the station -- "to play tapes and freestyle on the air, before he released any records," as JP Chill remembers. Later, Common paid tribute to WHPK on "Nuthin' To Do," a track from his classic album "Resurrection": "Then 'HPK was the only station that would [expletive] with rap."

"'HPK has had a much greater influence on this city than college radio usually does," observes aspiring Chicago MC Anonymous. "WHPK has been monumental in raising the talent level on the scene, and in building Chicago hip-hop as a whole."

"I'd listen to JP Chill at my grandparents' when I was a kid -- I remember moving the radio all over the apartment, attaching wire hangers to it, anything to strengthen the signal," recalls Foster Garvin, who years later would go on to co-host "Time Travel," a noted hip-hop show on Northwestern University's WNUR-FM 89.3 that bowed in 1995.

Until now, WHPK's low-power 100-watt signal has limited its broadcast reach to the South Side and environs, circumscribing most of its immediate influence within that geographical area. But that could be changing by this summer, when a long-delayed move to online streaming is expected to take place. Although some of this article's interviewees were skeptical, taking a we'll-believe-it-when-we-see-it stance, station manager Krista Christophe assures that "we've ordered the computers and the server. We'll probably be streaming in late May or early June."

`CTA Radio'

It's another Wednesday night at WHPK central, a compact second-floor studio in the U. of C.'s Gothic-spired, century-old Mandel Hall, and another long-running and popular weekly hip-hop show is on the air. It's gone by several names, but the current moniker, "CTA Radio," has been in place since early in the millennium.

There are Wednesday nights at 'HPK when you can't get in the door during the show's 9 p.m. to midnight run time. "CTA Radio" typically draws a sizable, lively contingent of local rappers, beatmakers and deejays, all come to seek airplay for a new song -- which may be the only significant airtime they'll ever receive -- network with colleagues, or maybe join in an on-air freestyle session. And 'HPK's bite-size control room and attached music library -- which, while hardly capacious itself, manages to house an estimated 30,000-plus vinyl LPs and CDs from floor to ceiling -- can scarcely contain them all.

This particular Wednesday is comparatively quiet, but the handful of Chicago MCs, producers and indie-label entrepreneurs here are navigating the scene like seasoned mariners. "A peaceful social gathering," pronounces Nick, a young graffiti writer and frequent visitor who lives nearby. As he speaks, local rapper Mose the Third's latest self-released CD is being aired on "CTA Radio."

Mose himself remarks that he's been an 'HPK listener since the mid-'90s.

Inside WHPK's control room are "CTA Radio" hosts and prominent local hip-hop figures Pugs Atomz, Kevin Maxey and Thaione Davis. (Atomz and Davis are independent rappers, as is temporarily absent co-host Cos G, who's lending support to local producers in a beat battle at a downtown club; he's expected shortly). They periodically punctuate the flow of music with chat both humorous and topical -- "We're about hip-hop politics and culture," says Davis -- but spend most of the three hours spinning their signature, emphatically egalitarian blend of underground and mainstream rap.